SDAI, you wrote:
>"The problem with this speech is, it really doesn't offer viable alternatives to the dilemmas the nation faces."

No, but he sure points out the road signs of where we're headed (and with good observations).
If you have a problem, you name the problem FIRST, then you go about figuring out a better solution.
I can think of MANY other things we could be doing than what Bush & Co. are doing right now.
With them, it's shoot-from-the-hip, ask questions later.

>"Taking bin Laden's message about this being 'about Caspian Sea oil' and Unocal is preposterous - but is what bin Laden wants."

It is not preposterous.
You know and I know that we went into Afganistan and shored up the Taliban for SEVERAL reasons years ago, and it wasn't the fear of the Afghans getting Communism either.
The cash from oil and poppies can flow through there......and where there's money or profit, then there shall we be.
It's very American.
Oil and heroin are to be moved through Afganistan, and there are many within our government who have profited (and who stand to profit) from these resources.

>"It is ironic that these same folks who want to blame the oil companies - never support drilling on our soil so that we would be less dependant upon foreign oil. "

You DO have a point here, but anyone with alternative ideas about other sources of energy, have been conspired against by the lawyers of the big oil companies for over 25 years now.

>"This war is not about oil."

Then what is it about?
Revenge?

>"As for personal liberties being given away...
The few changes made for detainment of suspected terrorists and military tribunals will discourage many non-suicidal would-be terrorists."

You sound like a policy maker, you are so sure of yourself.
Obviously, you must live under some sort of a "special security" umbrella, or you SHOULD BE alarmed at the changes that are taking place right here, right now, that take our privacy AND civil liberties away!

>"These sorts of laws are not intended to be used on John Q. Taxpayer ......."

But you should KNOW that once these laws are passed and police agencies are used under some federal powers act, that ANYONE can be monitored, searched, detained and arrested for ANYTHING, as the terms of the contract are loose, to say the least.
And they already have a muzzle on freedom of speech....soon it will extend to anyone even voicing an OPINION contrary to what the "state" deems is correct.
And you should know, how closely "they" are WATCHING all of "us" (n'est pas?)

>"As you are so well aware - government is based upon power. If the people do not empower a government - it is worthless. "

I find this statement of yours truly frightening.
Our governmnet is FOR the people and BY the people.
It is a system of laws with safety nets to protect the rights of American citizens. Our new President is seeing fit to re-invent all these laws, without tacit approval of Congress.......railroading in new legislation that make us (the people) powerless.
Good grief Derek!
Where's your thinking cap on this one??

>"Regional marshall law might be imposed by states or even local regions as things get out of hand and the negative half of society - which is normally kept in check - unleashes itself and the looters and rioters and price-gougers create a mini-anarchy in the US which is hard to bounce back from."

This sounds like another one of your elitist views.
Are you sure you're not a policy maker?
Have you been investing in Wackenhut or privatized prisons?
People won't get out of hand if you give them life, liberty and freedom. And just as there are "looters" and "price gougers" in the streets, there are just as many (or more) living in and around Washington, sitting on leather chairs in oval style offices, writing new declarations and laws that will be a bitter pill for most Americans to swallow.
What YOU think is good for this country, just won't work.

>"I hope to see the Homeland Defense office emerge as a well-funded Civil Defense agency and not an intelligence or policing arm of the Executive Branch.
The FBI and CIA should be the ones to monitor national and international US interests."

Well, we don't need another "intelligence agency" (an oxymoron if there ever was one) as the right hand never knows what the left hand is doing anyway, seeing as how these agencies are manipulated by the people who truly run this country from behind-the-scenes.
The recent scandals prove to me that these "intelligence agencies" conveniently DON'T work, when they're not "required to", but have succeeded in harassing, prosecuting and murdering those in the US and abroad who are opposed to their "special interest policies".
Gag.

I finish with Representative Ron Pauls' statement from his speech a couple of days ago...for it rings true today, now more than ever:
"Most of the major ills of the world have been caused by well-meaning
people who ignored the principle of individual freedom, except as applied to themselves, and who were obsessed with fanatical zeal to improve the lot of mankind-in-the-mass through some pet formula of their own. The harm done by ordinary criminals, murderers, gangsters, and thieves is negligible in comparison with the agony inflicted upon human beings by the professional do-gooders, who attempt to set themselves up as gods on earth and who would ruthlessly force their views on all others- with the abiding assurance that the end justifies the means."